Former Vice President Joe Biden appears to be in the tank for confiscating millions of lawfully owned firearms and locking up gun owners who dare to resist.

Biden invited Robert Francis “Beto” O’Rourke, the failed presidential contender, on the stage in a rally in Texas and declared him the gun control sheriff for the Biden campaign. “I want to make something clear – I’m gonna guarantee you, this is not the last you’re seeing of this guy. You’re gonna take care of the gun problem with me, you’re gonna be the one who leads this effort. I’m counting on you, I’m counting on you, we need you badly,” he said.

O’Rourke’s own presidential ambitions crashed and burned last year shortly after he emphatically announced in a primary debate, “Hell, yes, we’re going to take your AR-15, your AK-47.”

He Said It

That’s right. The former U.S. congressman from Texas proposed forcefully confiscating the more than 17.7 million commonly owned modern sporting rifles in circulation today. Any owner who dared to not “voluntarily comply” with his confiscation vision would face jail time.

O’Rouke said, “I think just as in any law that is not followed or flagrantly abused there have to be consequences or else there is no respect for the law. So in that case I think there would be a visit by law enforcement to recover that firearm and make sure that it is purchased, bought back, so that it cannot be potentially used against somebody else.”

O’Rourke masked his confiscation ideas as a “mandatory buyback.” Even if, and it’s very doubtful, Americans would turn out en masse to surrender their right to keep and bear arms, the costs would be overwhelming. O’Rourke commented on an Arkansas stop where AR-15s sold for $395, certainly on the low side of the cost of modern sporting rifle.

But if that were the running cost for Beto’s federal government confiscation, it would be nearly $7 billion. That’s assuming every modern sporting rifle is worth only $395. If the median price were closer to $500, it’s $9 billion. At $750, it’s $13.2 billion, and at an even grand per rifle, it’s a clean $17.7 billion. Pretty soon, we’re talking about real money, even for politicians who love to spend other people’s money.

Economic aside, O’Rourke couldn’t answer the dilemma of his proposal. Criminals, by definition, don’t obey the law. Law-abiding citizens do. His confiscation answer would only disarm a civil society and leave them vulnerable to criminals who would prey upon them.

That Dog Won’t Hunt

O’Rourke later tried to amend his proposal when a teen hunter in Iowa challenged him on why he wanted to confiscate the young man’s hunting rifle. “So, this is the first time that I’ve heard the case made for using an AR-15 to hunt deer,” O’Rourke said. “I’ve heard feral hogs in Texas, which are a real problem…”

He offered that Americans could follow the English or German models and keep guns locked in hunt clubs. Except that’s not what the Second Amendment says.

That’s not all O’Rourke wants, either. His gun control agenda included federal registration for all guns, mandatory training and licensing for firearms ownership, mandatory but technically impossible microstamping, a ban on standard magazines and suppressors, increase on firearms excise taxes to pay for “gun violence” programs, and age-based gun bans.

O’Rourke also called to revive the Obama administration’s illegal Operation Choke Point by having credit card companies to refuse to honor sales for modern sporting rifles. It was an idea pushed by New York Times’ Alan Ross Sorkin to have businesses decide which rights are proper for Americans.

Shine up that tin star. Looks like O’Rourke’s the new gun control sheriff in town.

Lawrence G. Keane is a senior vice president and general counsel for the National Shooting Sports Foundation, the firearms industry trade association.

Contrary to the Supreme Court’s claim in District of Columbia v. Heller, the term ‘dangerous and unusual weapons’ has historically not been applied to weapons themselves, but to carrying them in an intimidating manner.